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Dr. Shepard delivers entertaining State of the University Address

SILVER CITY — Brimming with ideas and energy, Western New Mexico University President Joe Shepard stepped into Gowns, Gifts, ‘N More, a downtown coffee shop, Saturday afternoon to offer his annual State of the University address.

SILVER CITY — Brimming with ideas and energy, Western New Mexico University President Joe Shepard stepped into Gowns, Gifts, ‘N More, a downtown coffee shop, Saturday afternoon to offer his annual State of the University address. As usual, it was an entertaining, off-the-cuff excursion into many facets of WNMU, the Town of Silver City, and the larger society.

He began, as in the past, by reciting many improvements undertaken to the university campus on his watch – the Fitness Center, the movie theater at Light Hall (“Only $2; but, sorry, no senior discounts!”), a mariachi band that recently took second place state-wide, and regular concerts and lectures. (Valerie Plame, former CIA operative illegally exposed under the Bush administration will appear on campus next month.) Most recently, Shepard noted the Gardens musical venue on a hill outside Bowden Hall.

Western New Mexico University and Silver City are inter-twined, he implied. “When a parent comes here, they’re looking at the community as well as the university.” He might have mentioned the annual “Back Bash” celebration on downtown Bullard Street as another form of outreach, and one could hear a band warming up for a street dance in the parking lot next door. But about then, with a crack of thunder, the monsoon season intervened, and the Bash was washed out in a deluge.

Shepard turned somber, describing the fiscal environment in which WNMU must try to survive. Year after year brings multi-million-dollar budget cutbacks in state coffers as New Mexico suffers from its reliance on revenues from oil and gas industries that face mounting global competition. While none of Governor Susana Martinez’s budget cuts as yet have been applied to higher education, Shepard believes the writing is on the wall. Yet, through careful management, he maintains WNMU will escape layoffs seen at larger universities in the state.

Western’s enrollment is stable, he said, despite the challenges it faces as an open enrollment institution. With a total head count of 3500, some 1200 students must be replaced each year, due to graduation and attrition. (According to current data from the university, enrollment on the Silver City campus is up slightly compared to last year, as is the number of new freshmen and also dorm occupancy – now at 94 percent.)

“But we cannot rely on what we are today,” Shepard stressed. He highlighted the need for an “applied liberal arts, Renaissance-style” of education to address the challenges of a world in transformation. There will be technological changes: in virtual reality, to drones and robotics, telemedicine, and international education. Shepard cited WNMU’s successful partnerships with universities in Mexico, and said they are discussing developing an online MBA in Spanish.

He said the future in Grant County will include water diversion – “not from the Gila River” but on a larger scale. “When the copper mines shut down, their greatest asset will be their water rights.” Change is coming, close at hand.

Shepard closed with a pitch to vote for Bond C (Higher Education – worth $5 million to Western) and Bond B (Libraries) in the November election, and for WNMU in general. “Someday that mine will shut down,” he repeated, “But at the end of the day, I ask you to support this university so that it will be here for our children and for theirs.”